


Smile

by WindwiseWords



Series: Xenogen City [45]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Anniversary, Doctor/Patient, Friendship, Hobbies, Mental Instability, Miscommunication, Off the Clock, Therapist/Patient relationship, Whirl Being Whirl, Whirl NOT being Whirl, quickly resolved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 18:11:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9083725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WindwiseWords/pseuds/WindwiseWords
Summary: Rung decides to build models on the roof, and Whirl drops by to celebrate a very special occasion.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Whirl is a 'learn over time' sort of guy in my opinion. As in he can learn new behaviors, just takes him many repeated tries. If anything, it's the sitting still and existing rather than doing that is the biggest gift for Rung.

Rung sat out on the roof today, smiling as he carefully painted a new model of earth ship. The _Titanic_ and its tragic story captured his attention, moving him to tears on movie night the day before. And now he finished the smallest details, tiny windows. Human sized models provided extra challenge, and a reason to head to the mainland.

Rung sensed loneliness creeping into his head and quickly shook it out, gently blowing on the model to make the paint set faster. He felt eagerness shoot up then die back; nobody cared about his models before. There was nobody to share them with really.

Just as the paint began to fully set up a distant call made him look to the sky, and he put on a smile though annoyance prickled up his spine. Whirl came in for a heavy landing, causing Rung to brace the model and hope, pray the angry mech didn’t smash it.

“Hey Eyebrows!” Whirl chirped, strutting over and inspecting what he was doing. “That’s boring Eyebrows. You’re boring.”

Rung just kept the smile up and nodded. “I understand why you think that, Whirl. You think it is too tedious.” The instant freeze in Whirl’s posture made Rung brace himself for a smack. It happened before and it would happen again, Whirl getting worked up by ‘therapist bullscrap’ as he put it.

The swing never came. “No. Nah. You got it wrong Eyebrows. There’s just better things to do right now.” And Rung was then presented with a box.

The box was wrapped in brown paper, held by way too much packing tape, and had tell-tale scratches on the paper. Whirl wrapped it.

“Oh… Um, thank you Whirl.” He took the box and sat back at his table, picking carefully at the tape to try to unwrap it. “May I ask what the occasion is?”

Whirl paused again, and Rung almost grinned; it took weeks but Whirl finally learned to think before speaking. If only with Rung, and on occasion Tailgate. Very rare occasion. “Yea. I guess it’s just something I remember, but I did some math. I know, I did smart stuff for once.” He caught the subtle raise of Rung’s brow and before the therapist could correct what his surprise was, Whirl waved a claw. “No, my turn to talk. It’s been a long time, Eyebrows. Today is this stupid mudball’s equivalent to the first day you took my case on.”

There was no ‘thank you’ or sweet words. Rung just stared at his most difficult patient with a look of awe and then grinned before continuing to open the package. Whirl got impatient, and dragged a sharp claw down the tape to split it and then Rung pulled the paper off.

The model was of a helicopter. Reading the particular type, Rung snapped his head up to Whirl who leaned in to look at it.

“Closest one I could get to me. I don’t know, it seemed all mushy and you like that stuff. Plus you can yell at it when I really slag you off without breaking your code of ethics stuff.” Whirl then opened his subspace and put a new pack of tiny paint tins down. “I mean you can paint it however you want but I’ll model for you if you want.”

Rung stayed silent, staring at it for a long time. A bad move with Whirl, who fidgeted and increasingly became anxious until he saw a drop slip from behind his therapist’s glasses. “Aww scrap, Eyebrows, I didn’t mean to—“

“It’s perfect Whirl. Thank you.” He said gently, smiling up at his patient and nodding, then hugging the box close. Among other things, Rung considered Whirl a very good friend. He’d never been there for him emotionally but if someone picked on him or called him anything but ‘Rung’ the chopper would start a fight.

Whirl actually found himself unable to respond. Anger wasn’t right; he at first though Rung was just that upset with the gift. But he was just that… _Happy._ “Eyebrows, you put up with a lot from bots. Never saw you cry though. It’s okay to cry you know.”

Rung laughed a bit and nodded, listening to Whirl parrot back what he always told the angry mech. “Thank you, Whirl. I’ll get started on this right now.” And he began to open the box and take out the pieces, setting the paints it came with aside in favor of the special ones Whirl brought. His own colors. On closer inspection, the final tin of paint was his color. “Whirl…?”

“Well I don’t exactly know what you transform into but if you start making models of your patients, they’re gonna need a Rung too.” The explanation, blunt as it was and kind of personifying the lifeless models, made Rung smile again. Never, ever would Whirl admit it, but he preferred the doctor smiling. Sometimes it made him angry when Rung wouldn’t smile, then he’d hit him. Smile stayed away a long time after that, and he felt _guilt_ for it.

As Rung began to carefully check the instructions for the model, Whirl decided to sit down in the other chair, and watch. _Boring as watching paint dry,_ he thought privately, but the tiny pleased look on Rung’s face as he made the base of the model snap together was worth it. Every other day they met, it was about Whirl. For one day the mech could let it be about his Eyebrows.


End file.
